


Shortest Way Home

by trashofalltrades



Category: Captain Marvel (2019), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Memory Loss, Monica being adorbale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-12
Updated: 2019-03-12
Packaged: 2019-11-16 01:29:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18084809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trashofalltrades/pseuds/trashofalltrades
Summary: In the six years following the crash, Maria grieves and tries to rebuild. Just when she's coming to terms with a lack of answers, a surprise guest and a reunion changes everything for the better.





	Shortest Way Home

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to stardians for movie watching with me and the fic help. The title is taken from Pete Buttigieg's book by the same name.

**1989**

Getting called into the boss’s office was never good. Especially when Carol hadn’t come back and wasn’t responding to her pager. Especially when there had been chatter about a plane crash.

Her commanding officer played the role of telegram deliverer, saying strings of words she didn’t fully hear. No remains. Last witness. Unauthorized. Investigation. My condolences.

Maria didn’t retain any of it, instead she went home at the end of her shift, the road blurry through her tears.

She got Monica to bed, not in any position to tell her yet, brushing off her frown as being tired and Carol’s absence as a mission.

She didn’t know who to call. Who to talk to. She was supposed to be able to call Carol, but she was gone. “If lives are at stake, then I’ll fly the plane” was what she had said, what she had lived by. Her call sign wasn’t “Avenger” for nothing.

Damn her beautiful heart—the only life at stake had been her own.

Instead of sleeping she made a plan. She would answer their questions as best she knew— there was no use or point in making herself an adversary. And she would get answers. She would insist they go back and try to find her, because there was no way a woman as strong as she was would let a measly plane crash take her out.

 

**1990**

The investigation was still dragging, but they were considerate enough to give her all that they had found—part of a dog tag that showed the name Carol Dan with half an ID number below it. They wouldn’t tell her what else they were doing, whether they had searched for her or already given up. There was nothing yet, besides a jagged piece of metal.

She took it home, allowing Monica to see it before she added it to “The Box.” The box was where she had started putting mementos that were too painful to look at.

“Did you ask them more questions? Is she coming back soon?”

“I don’t know, baby,” she whispered, pulling her into a hug. “They’re still looking.”

“But I thought you said she would come home.” She could feel the sniffles start into her shirt. “I miss her.”

“I do too. But wherever she is, she wouldn’t want you to worry about her.”

“Can I look at the pictures again?” she asked, pulling away so she could grab the box.

“Of course.”

They looked at the stacks of photos carefully piled at the bottom. The two of them in flight school, the day of their first mission. There was Carol holding a newborn Monica at the hospital, arms wrapped tightly around her while she looked at the camera with misty eyes. And then there were birthday parties, Carol teaching Monica how to blow bubbles and ride a bike.

There was a whole life in that box.

 

**1991**

They gave her a copy of the report, even though ninety percent of it was redacted.

She had called bull on that. “I deserve to know,” she repeated over and over. “What can be so secret that you don’t even try to keep looking? To not tell me what happened? Bodies don’t just disappear after radioing in a crash location,” she told her commanding officers. They just shook their heads, murmuring condolences and lines about mission secrecy.

No one explained how an unofficial mission could have been top secret, or why a top-secret mission would have been thrown together so haphazardly.

She lodged a few petitions that went ignored. Finally, she went back to her boss, furious.  “You care more about the cover up than about her. I just want answers. I could go to the media and talk about this, but I haven’t yet—”

“And you won’t’” he snapped. “You’re being too emotional about this. We are on the cusp of victory with the Soviets, and you want to divert our attention to something from two years ago?”

“Sir, I think—”

“I think it’s time you focus on your job. We could always reassign you. We only need so many female pilots anyway.”

 

She took it as a good time to retire. There were more opportunities as a private mechanic or pilot with a lot less danger. And her parents would be happier, knowing that she was safer and not up against sexist men day in and day out.

She took the required separation classes, signed the piles of paperwork. And then her parents organized a small party at their house, just for a few of her Air Force friends, with some cake and some wine.

They talked about how nice this “retirement” would be. No more orders to follow or crazy hours. No risk, more time with Monica.

It was the right choice, and yet so far from what she had imagined her life would be like.

 

**1992**

“Mom? Auntie Carol’s dead, isn’t she?”

Maria set down her fork, looking across the dinner table at her. “Technically she’s considered missing. We’re not sure what happened, but I don’t think she’s going to come back.”

Monica picked at a thread on the bottom of her Air Force shirt, staring down at the table. “Okay.”

“I have something of hers for you though, she’d want you to have it.”

She perked up a little as Maria led her upstairs to her closet. “She and I both liked to wear bomber jackets. You should have hers.”  She pulled to brown leather jacket off the hanger, rubbing out some of the hanger bumps. It still smelled like her, if she got close to it.

She placed the jacket in her hands, Monica’s eyes growing wide.

“Can I wear it?”

“If you’re careful. It’s gonna be a little big on you though.”

She slid it on, the sleeves falling well past her hands. “It’s comfy.”

“It is. You should keep it in your room, that way you have a part of her to hold on to.”

She nodded, running out of the bedroom, the bottom of the jacket flapping behind her as she did so.

 

**1993**

Working on planes was when she felt the most peaceful. It was just her and the work, and with some elbow grease and ingenuity, everything could be made right. She set up a workshop next to the house, blessed to be able to work from her own front yard. She had to admit, thee were perks to being self-employed.

On Fridays she wrapped things up early, she and Monica going to dinner with her parents or dropping Monica there and going to have a girls’ night.

Other times she and Monica would have a TV night, with Monica insisting on painting her nails, never mind the fact that they would be chipped and covered in grease the next day. And every time, Monica would fall asleep while watching Fresh Prince reruns, meaning she had to be the one to lug her up the stairs to bed, a feat that used to be easier when she was littler. She needed to stop growing up, if only for a moment.           

 

**1994**

Monica would come watch her work sometimes. After the school bus dropped her off, she would plop down on an extra stool by her workbench and tell her all about her day.

“I have another vocab test this week she said,” rolling her eyes.

“Good. Even spaceship designers have to know how to spell things correctly.”

She made a face. “Today a boy in my class said I can’t build spaceships, only people at NASA do that.”

“Well then you’ll just have to work for NASA, won’t you? Maybe you’ll even go to space one day. Or fly planes like Me and Auntie Carol.”

She nodded. “Maybe not an astronaut though. The space suits look really uncomfortable.”

“Design new ones then.”

“Could I make them look like your jackets?”

 “I don’t see why not.”

 “Okay. I’m going to go draw designs of them!” she said, running towards the house.

 She put down her wrench, turning to call after her. “Homework first! I’m sure Sally Ride got great grades on her spelling tests.”

 

**1995**

Carol and Fury drove up to the house, taking in the planes and mechanical parts in the work space nearby as they stepped out of the car.

She looked around, desperately hoping everything would come flooding back, that she would know the significance of this place. The memories eluded her, but there was an odd sense of comfort. It smelled nice, a little like motor oil and freshly cut grass.

Fury hung back as she slowly walked underneath the work space’s covering. She spotted a woman at the workbench, her short black hair swept back, cursing at whatever she was working on.

“Um, excuse me? I’m looking for a Maria Rambeau? I don’t mean to intrude, I just have a few questions. We need to know about a woman named Dr. Lawson?”

The woman froze for a second before slowly turning around to look at her, her eyes wide.

She put down her tools and took a few steps towards her, before she broke into a run, pulling Carol towards her and kissing her.

She was stunned for a moment before she eventually relaxed into it, kissing back. The memories were quite literally on the tip of her tongue, but she wasn’t going to squander a good kiss by trying to remember the details.

There was a flash though, from one of the memories the Skrulls had looked though. They were on a tarmac and she was standing next to the woman—Maria—both clad in Air Force uniforms.

“Higher further faster baby,” she could hear herself say, with a smile in her voice.

She could see Maria nod, walking forward with a sort of swagger before looking over her shoulder with an eyebrow raised—a look that meant “I can’t kiss you now without us getting fired but when we get home…”

When they finally broke apart she stood there, mouth half open, almost more confused than she had started.

 “I think we know what she meant to you now,” Fury called from behind them. “Now can we please go inside and ask her questions?”

She laughed, looking at Maria. “If you don’t mind… we have a lot to sort out. _I_ have a lot to sort out, I’m not really sure who I am.”

“You will,” she said, wiping away tears. “But I want to reintroduce you to someone first.”

She led them inside, calling up the stairs to someone named Monica.

A girl came running down, stopping dead when she saw Carol before throwing herself at her for a giant hug, nearly choking her.

“Auntie Carol! I thought… we thought you were gone.”

“Well, I’m back now, Lieutenant Trouble,” she said, other flashes starting to come back of a little girl running around her legs or sitting in the middle of a giant mess with a smile on her face.

“Auntie’s back! Auntie’s back!” she chanted before being sent back up to her room at Maria’s request.

Maria made them coffee, her hands still shaking, before they sat down to work through some information, with Fury occasionally playing babysitter.

After a while Monica lost patience, grabbing her arm and dragging her to what she called “the box.”

“It’s a bunch of mementos of you,” Maria explained as they walked into the next room, greeted by an explosion of photographs.

She ran her hands over them, more snapshots coming back of her life with these people who she had loved. Monica pressed part of her dog tag into her hand, her name cut in half, before running upstairs to get her old jacket Maria had saved.

By the end she was near tears, turning towards Maria with an expression paralyzed by grief. “ I didn’t know—I would have tried to come back.”

“You came as soon as you could. It’s okay now,” Maria whispered. “Or it will be. We’ll figure this out. Your place here—whatever these alien things are. We got this. Higher further faster, yeah?”

She nodded, giving a weak laugh. “Higher further faster,” she repeated.

Monica interrupted their conversation, trying to drag Carol upstairs to show off her room. 

She smiled, following along behind her before she scooped her up and swung her around, playing airplane like she thought they used to. Behind her she could her Maria laughing, Fury giving a half-hearted warning that they had work to do.

She tossed Monica onto her bed with a grin. Whatever came next, she had home to come back to.


End file.
